President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama greet Tuskeegee Airmen in the East Garden Room of the White House prior to a screening of the film “Red Tails” in the Family Theater, Jan. 13, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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Today:

12:30: Press Briefing by Press Secretary Jay Carney

2:15: President Obama holds a bilateral meeting with President Mariano Rajoy Brey of Spain

The Week Ahead:

Tuesday: The President will hold a Cabinet meeting, and in the afternoon he will welcome the 2013 NBA Champion Miami Heat to the White House to honor the team on winning their second straight championship title

Wednesday: The President will travel to Raleigh, North Carolina, for an event on the economy

Thursday: The President and First Lady will host an event at the White House on expanding college opportunity

Friday: The President will make remarks about the outcome of the review that he has led on the issue of signal intelligence

Suddenly it’s O.K., even mandatory, for politicians with national ambitions to talk about helping the poor. This is easy for Democrats, who can go back to being the party of F.D.R. and L.B.J. It’s much more difficult for Republicans, who are having a hard time shaking their reputation for reverse Robin-Hoodism, for being the party that takes from the poor and gives to the rich.

And the reason that reputation is so hard to shake is that it’s justified. It’s not much of an exaggeration to say that right now Republicans are doing all they can to hurt the poor, and they would have inflicted vast additional harm if they had won the 2012 election.

With a crucial Senate vote set for today on the Democratic plan to extend jobless benefits, Republicans continue to offer one reason after another for opposing the extension. At this point, their rationales are all over the place.
Oddly, though, it has fallen to a Republican Senator to reveal just how flimsy GOP reasoning on the issue has become. On Face the Nation yesterday, Marco Rubio declared that there is a “general consensus” that jobless benefits should be extended. If true, this is certainly welcome news. But note how Rubio said this….

Under George W. Bush, the GOP never balked at extending unemployment benefits, but that was then. Their newfound intransigence on this issue proves afresh that the party has been hijacked by extremists.

So this is showdown week in Congress for extension of unemployment benefits. Frankly, it looks bleak. No, it’s not that the public is against it. In fact far from it—58 percent support the extension in a new poll. But as I’ve written a kajillion times these last few years, it unfortunately doesn’t much matter what the people think. Republicans in Congress care only about the views of the more radical half of their party. And in that same poll, Republicans opposed the extension 54-42.

The Office of the Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has opened a federal investigation into whether New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) improperly used Hurricane Sandy relief funds to produce commercials staring himself and his family ahead of his re-election campaign. Auditors will examine how the Christie administration used $25 million set aside for “a marketing campaign to promote the Jersey Shore and encourage tourism,” focusing on the bidding process to award a $4.7 million to a politically connected firm that cast Christie and his family in the Sandy ads, while “a comparable firm proposed billing the state $2.5 million for similar work” but did not include Christie in the commercials.

The investigation into New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s (R) bridge scandal is not open-ended. A state Assembly probe was approved last year and given the legal authority to explore the alleged misconduct, but when the legislative session ends, so too does the committee’s power to investigate further – and the session technically ends tomorrow.

In practical terms, that means state lawmakers will have to reauthorize the probe or the process will effectively come to a halt. Christie and his team have been well aware of the deadline, and by all appearances, hoped to run out the clock.

Over the weekend, however, we learned that the investigation is very likely to continue and expand.

A couple very interesting new threads on the Bridgegate story. As I’ve mentioned, as the scope of the Bridge closure effort and the attempt to cover it up grow, payback for a small town Mayor’s Christie non-endorsement has seemed increasingly implausible as a motive. This morning Brian Murphy went on Steve Kornacki’s show to discuss a major billion dollar development project which would have been gravely impacted (perhaps scuttled altogether) by any permanent move to create a traffic choke point in Fort Lee. (There’s an important disclosure that both men have been very forthcoming about: both worked for Wildstein in former lives when Wildstein ran a NJ politics website called PolitickerNJ.com.) But before getting to that there’s another aspect of this story which I think deserves attention.

TPM: Other Jersey Mayors Say They May Have Been Punished For Not Endorsing Christie

Aides close to Chris Christie shut down lanes on the George Washington Bridge last summer, the popular theory goes, as a means of revenge against a Democratic mayor who didn’t endorse the governor for re-election. But other Democratic mayors may have received similar political payback.

Jersey City, N.J. Mayor Steve Fulop told the Wall Street Journal in a story published late Sunday that he’s been frozen out since he opted against endorsing Christie last year. The Journal reported that Christie officials offered Fulop “new access to state commissioners, who hold the purse strings for many Jersey City services” in exchange for his support.

Rob Robinson from the Correspondence Office walks on the Colonnade carrying a gift portrtait of Abraham Lincoln to the West Wing of the White House, Jan. 13, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

President Obama talks with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil to discuss response to the earthquake crisis in Haiti, as NSC Chief of Staff Denis McDonough listens, in the Oval Office, Jan. 13, 2010 (Photo by Pete Souza)

First Lady Michelle Obama watches a performance backstage with iCarly cast members Jennette McCurdy, left, and Miranda Cosgrove and members of her staff prior to an iCarly screening at Hayfield Secondary School in Alexandria, Va., Jan. 13, 2012 (Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

I agree, HF. he’s going to reiterate his statement that if they’re going to push sanctions they might as well come right out and say they want a war with Iran. Don’t think he’s going to take any prisoners in this meeting. He’s angry at this group, as well he should be.

FYI –I called Cory Booker’s office this morning to express my unhappiness with his decision to support Menendez over the president’s request for no new sanctions on Iran yet. I said the president has enough to deal with the repubs. he doesn’t need disloyalty from his own party, especially since the president has made great decisions in foreign policy. The guy who took my message seemed to understand my concerns. I have tried repeatedly to get through to Menendez but his phone is busy. Don’t know what that means. I also told Booker’s guy, Booker represents the interests of the American people not AIPAC.

Good for you Diane, I don’t know what Senator Booker’s problem is but he should follow President Obama’s queue when it comes to foreign policy. I’m not saying that Sen. Booker should rubber stamp everything President Obama does, but I do believe President Obama has shown he knows how to effectively deal with the Middle East considering his track record.

Just hours before leaving office, former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) issued an opinion that appears intended to entrench his own anti-gay policy preferences while he could still speak as his state’s top legal officer. Cuccinelli, who once claimed that the “homosexual agenda… brings nothing but self-destruction, not only physically but of their soul,” lost his bid for Virginia governor to recently inaugurated Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D).

Cuccinelli’s non-binding opinion, which is dated January 10, 2014, concludes that “a Governor may not direct or require any agency of state government to allow same-sex couples to receive joint marital status for Virginia income tax returns.” Cuccinelli’s successor, Democrat Mark Herring, was sworn in January 11.

The question of whether married same-sex couples may file joint Virginia tax forms hinges upon a potential conflict in state law. Although the state constitution includes an expansive ban on same-sex marriages or similar arrangements, gay rights advocates note that forbidding same-sex couples from filing jointly “is in conflict with the state law that requires conformity with federal rules” — married couples of all kinds file joint tax returns under federal law.

It should be interesting to see if McAuliffe can actually govern, administrate and do a job that demands responsiveness to his constituents. He’s never held office. I’m hoping for the best, although he is not my favorite Dem.

The Supreme Court on Monday will examine the scope of presidential recess appointment powers.

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“The absurdity of the appeals court’s ruling reaches not just into the future but into the past. If Mr. Obama’s recess appointments are ruled unconstitutional, thousands of other such appointments made over the years by other presidents would be called into question, not to mention more than 1,300 rulings made by the “invalid” labor board.”

Good for Michelle! She’s on to the best part of her life now…..I think that women begin to feel free after 50. We dread it for a long time, then when it happens we say…..Wow! I feel good, I’m freer to be myself and do exciting things….There is just a freedom that comes with achieving that milestone. We’ve gotten beyond worrying about what others say about us, and know who we are, and where we’re going. Bravo for her.

The idea that you would inflate taxes for millions of poor kids living on the margins in order to pay for unemployment insurance for laid-off workers sent out in the cold by Republican ideological intransigence is nothing short of an immoral act by a political party being slowly strangled by far-right radicals hell-bent on destroying the American social contract.

From what I’ve noticed, the court always leans against the government in their questioning. It happened in the ACA case and everyone was all over the government’s attorney. This is the adversarial method, and they apply it liberally.

IMPORTANT******In 2008, Freedom Industries secured a contract to distribute a line of products called Talon that are used as a binder in coal processing, according to a news release issued at the time. Freedom distributed Talon to eight states, including West Virginia.

“We are excited to offer our customers inventive products like Talon that push past the status quo in coal recovery to bring profit and productivity benefits to mining preparation plants,” Joshua Herzing, a Freedom executive, said in the press release.

Talon is made by Georgia-Pacific Chemicals LLC. Georgia-Pacific is owned by the billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch.

The Koch brothers have, through a conservative group called Americans for Prosperity, spent millions of dollars campaigning against a wide array of environmental regulations.

On Saturday, Americans for Prosperity set up a water distribution site at Columbia Gas in Charleston.

Iraq Question. Hmm? No question to send Troops back in as Jay dealt with that last week. Angry McCain said yesterday on CNN that US is not sending troops. Yet he said that anyone suggesting that US could not have negotiated to keep troops would not be telling the whole story. What an arse.

Jon Karl on Christie……wants to know about the TIMING on Sandy investigation……Hmm? Karl….his buddy Christie, I suppose SHALL never be investigated? Jay said…..that is up to the Dept that handles that issue……DoJ.

New Jersey Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg (D) provided a letter to TPM on Monday showing that she attempted to alert Gov. Chris Christie (R) about lane closures on the George Washington Bridge in September, just six days after the lanes reopened.

The letter gets to the heart of one of the major unanswered questions in a scandal that has erupted from the closures: what did Christie know and when did he know it?

The lanes were closed on Sept. 9 and re-opened again on early on the morning of Sept. 13. Weinberg, whose district includes part of Fort Lee, N.J., which saw days of traffic gridlock because of the closures, wrote the letter on Sept. 19.

Thanks for all your news this day Nena – reading late it is a great catchup on the Jay’s press conference.

This letter appears in the emails – William (Pat) Schuber decided – via discussions – that his phone call would be a sufficient reply – no letter needed – seems like thinking it would be a good idea not to put anything in writing.

Every person on the PA executive seems to be part of the coverup – if not part of the original idea.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A city and county in southern New Mexico have settled a lawsuit filed by a man taken to two hospitals and subjected to anal probes over suspicion of hiding drugs.

Attorneys for David Eckert said Monday that Hidalgo County and the city of Deming recently settled their portion of a lawsuit for a total of $1.6 million.

The lawsuit was filed against police and sheriff’s officials in Deming and Hidalgo County, which borders Mexico. It alleges Deming police sought a search warrant for Eckert because they thought he appeared to be clenching his buttocks when he got out of his car in January 2013.

Despite the body searches, no drugs were found.

Hidalgo County and Deming officials both declined to comment about the settlement.

A lawsuit against doctors and the hospital in the case is still ongoing.

I’m running late on today’s “news,” but MSNBC is fixing to do a story about Hillary’s 2008 campaign “hit list.”

Shades of Christie? Nixon?

If this is true – and it’s one of her former collaborators who snitched – well, never irk a campaign staffer! Not to mention, if true, never have a hit list in the United States of America while running for President or any other elected office.

Looks like Ms Clinton and Mr Christie should be considering alternative forms of unemployment in their respective futures. Maybe they could form a consulting group – C&C Bullies, LLP – of course, after Mr Christie finishes his time in the big house.

Apparently, three named people on the HRC hit list (from the book) are John Kerry, Jay Rockefeller, and Claire MaCaskill (sp?).

We need new-school politics – where the candidate and twice-elected President has a team of rivals list ready to bring other Democrats back into the fold, instead of a hit list. Sick of those old-school shenanigans from the Clintons and their ilk.

A longtime New Jersey lawmaker contended Monday that “Democratic power brokers” aligned with Gov. Chris Christie (R) are trying to quash the investigation into lane closures on the George Washington Bridge.

State Sen. Richard Codey (D) was asked during an appearance on MSNBC about Christie’s bipartisan coalition of support, a point Republicans have been eager to highlight following the governor’s runaway re-election victory last year.

“Well, let’s talk about that. You’re talking about he’s involved with Democratic power brokers who are not members of the legislatures. So they deliver him votes. Simple as that,” Codey said. “And in my opinion, those power brokers are still trying to interrupt this investigation without question. So there’s a movement afoot, there has been for a while, to stop this whole thing and stop it cold. So this thing about bipartisanship, I don’t buy it for one day.”

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I am GLAD that he spoke Up. The Boss Mentality in NJ has got to be dismantled.

“For 500 marchers to assemble in Donetsk is the equivalent of 50,000 in Lviv or 500,000 in Kyiv. This is an earthshattering development, almost as important as the Euro Revolution itself. Think about it: Regionnaire hegemony in Donetsk has been broken. The place will never be the same again.

Watching the marchers, I couldn’t help but think of the three 1965 marches led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Alabama, from Selma to Montgomery. The civil rights activists, both black and white, marched into the belly of the beast—and emerged triumphant.”